4-3-3 showing it's benefits for Cabaye and Anita.

I concur

 

I've taken a knock to the head clearly

 

Unfortunately it damaged the optimistic(/realistic) part of the brain...

 

While I don't agree with the infamous overly negative Mr Malone, I do feel that some fans on here give the impression that Pardew is beyond reproach at the moment which shouldn't be the case.

He did a fantastic job for us last year, especially in the second half of the season when he changed us from hard working and hard to beat to a fluent attacking force through a change of formation (to 4-3-3). I'm slowly coming round to the opinion that the system/formation isn't as important as it may appear on paper, however style of play is important and Pardew has got that wrong more times than he has right this season for me.

Do I want him gone? Not even 1% of me wants him gone. But at the same time do I believe he's performed to the best of his ability this year? Not even close.

Now maybe my expectations are too high, but again this comes down to Pardew confirming in several different interviews that we're going to launch a serious assault on the top four. It can be argued that we're only three points off fourth spot, I can't argue with that fact so won't attempt to. I will however argue that anyone who believes an assault on the top four will be mounted with current style of play and level of performance is more than likely going to end up disappointed this year.

I accept this is a slightly controversial post, and many of you may feel that for me to expect top four is ridiculous (for the record I don't expect a top four finish, but I do expect better than what I've seen so far this season), but part of a manager's job is to manage the expectations of the fans. Redknapp is a good example of this, when they were top of the league and flying last year, he was telling the Spurs fans that they were a team that would mount a title challenge consistently over the next few seasons, safe to say this didn't happen and he lost his job. He then moaned and said it was a minor miracle that they finished fourth and he was unfairly dismissed. Well which one is it, are they title challengers or are they a team that should be grateful to finish fourth? Redknapp can't have it both ways and neither can Pardew.

He either needs to sack off all this talk of challenging the top four, or get the team performing to such a level that the fans can begin to believe it may be a possibility, until he does either of these he's susceptible to a certain level of criticism.

 

You say what I mean to say but in a much more intelligent way.

 

Doesn't look like too many agree with us to be fair, either that or it's a quiet night on here!

 

I get what your saying, but considering we've probably played a total of 90 minutes of good football this season and still gotten a decent amount of points, I think we should just maintain our cool for now.

Another win could see us right up there with the top teams come sunday, and we'll all be ****ing.

Another two points onto our current total, and we'd be 6th right now and ****ing. I think we've made a good start considering we're also unbeaten in Europe and looking like we're gonna top our group.

 

I agree the next two games are going to define our season, however I'm actually less confident of winning them based on performances and he fact we have major inury and suspension issues. West Ham and Swansea are playing better than us from what Ive seen.

 

I've posted on here showing our results in the hardest games have resulted in 9pts compared with 10 last season. That becomes 10pts compared to 13pts when you factor in the Villa result, and 13pts compared to 16pts when you factor in the Norwich result.

Reading is hard to put into a correct bracket, because there's no exact science for swapping the relegation teams with promotion teams, so I'll refrain. Basically we did only lost out on 2pts all last season to the them.
Wolves (we drew 2-2 at home, beat them 2-1 away)
Bolton (beat them 2-0 home & away)
Blackburn (beat them 2-0 away, 3-1 at home).

That'd be a difficult feat to repeat for us this year in all honesty, so it's up to the team to make it up in the matches like Wigan away, Norwich away and Fulham away where we were abysmal. Essentially though, to qualify our respective campaigns, we're at most 5pts (the range is 5-3) off last year

If we continue these projections (3pts, 4pts(for theoretical purposes) and 5pts) (X 3.8) we'll miss out on either 19 pts, 15pts, or 11pts. Overall, that means either;
46pts- which would not be good enough. and would leave us around 15-17.
50pts- which would be reasonable, but under par, and around 10-13
54pts- which would be ok, because historically that's good enough for 8th at least.

Relatively speaking, it's too early to say we've had a poor start. The sample isn't big enough. But what we can say is that at current pace pretty much every pre-season prediction for a drop in form associated with Europa participation is about accurate (loads of us had us to finish 7th or 8th). Based on the projections, what we can say is that Pardew was either being thick with his predictions of potential 4th, or attempting to play the media for some affect on his players. Either way, at current pace, he's way off (15pts at best based on last year's table and one of the champions league entrants not winning that comp and finishing 5th +).

I think this pretty much fits with what Sir Bob says, but of course it's not completely out of the question for us to gain ground on last season. This month we have West Ham (3pts required to keep pace), Swansea (3pts would mean we are 2/0pts off if we also beat the Hammers), Southampton (again 3pts needed to keep pace), Stoke (3pts needed to keep pace). Looking at it, that means all the games this month are "must win", if only statistically to keep pace with last season. Then we have December, and we can get ahead by taking points out of last season at Fulham or at home to Citeh. Looks tricky, and it bloody well should look that way, given how well we did last season! That's the task before us if Pardew wants to go one better this time. Realistically, think those saying 7th-10th at the start will be spot on at present (just my personal interpretation).

Performance wise, we can't calculate, but I think the fact we're down on points reflects the depletion in performance. We weren't Barca last year, and had to do a lot of what we've been doing lately to get as many points as we did. Theoretically, based on last season, this should be our month (as shown by the 4 wins/3 wins and a draw scenario we are left with after the Liverpool game). If we aren't getting close to that at the end of November, I think it's fair enough to be a little negative about it. If we get the 4 wins, we're right back to last season, and suddenly possibilities for 4th again. So I'd say there's no reason to panic right now at all.

Of course, the unknown factors include the Jan window, we've not lost Ba and Cisse to ACON this year, injuries etc. Last season injuries left us with a Simmo/Willo combo vs Norwich and we got slaughtered. Odds are that won't happen again. So there is reason to be optimistic we can get more points than currently predicted.

 

I'm on holiday next week so I'll sort through this then boss.

 

For a laugh. I did Sunderland's too...

Arsenal (A) last season 1-2... This year 0-0 (+1 pts) 1pt up from 0pts
Swansea (A) last season 0-0... This year 2-2 (0) 2pts up from 1pt
Liverpool (H) last season 1-0... This year 1-1 (-2pts) 3pts down from 4pts
Wigan (H) last season 1-2... This year 1-0 (+3pts) 6pts up from 4pts
Man Citeh (A) last season 3-3... This year 3-0 (-1pt) 6pts up from 5pts
Newcastle (H) last season 0-1... This year 1-1 (+1pt) 7pts up from 5 pts
Stoke (A) last season 1-0... This year 0-0 (-2pts) 8pts up from 7pts
Villa (H) last season 2-2... This year 0-1 (-1pt) 8pts level with 8pts

West Ham are newly promoted, so doing what we did with our results...

Sunderland vs Bolton = 4pts
Sunderland vs Blackburn = 3 pts
Sunderland vs Wolves = 1 pt

You can see that there's loads of potential improvement. And that West Ham's result means they have 9pts and either +1 point, -2 points, or level.

That means their projected gains/losses are either +4pts or -8pts or else they are par. Which would put them on the current paths relative to last season:

45 points - par. Around 14th-17th place.
49 points - 4 points up. Would have had them 10th last season, but mostly around 10th-14th.
37 points - 8 points down. No surprises this would have them 18th-20th most years. Would have saved them last year though!

What a waste of time!

Edit: HAHAHA bad maths first time... And again wrong. Good job I don't do accountancy!

 

I think people get way too bogged down in looking at football in very short periods of time. Its a disease of the modern game.

We've made a nice solid start with some tricky fixtures. We have manouvered ourselves into a nice position to push from. At the same time as all that, we've cruised through the Europa Group stages by the looks of things. Its not that I see Pardew as beyond reproach, its simply I think he has done a very good job in setting up the season. We may not have been at our best but I think to suggest Pardew has got it wrong more times than right is massively unfair. The PL is a real tough ask. When players hit top form a managers job can be very easy, and the freedom that comes with form can see little runs of points strung together.

To be fair to Pardew we don't want our players at their peak right now. Otherwise we'll running on empty down the stretch. Pardew wants us to progress in Europe and at some stage he'll need to play his top guns to progress. Hopefully that will be after xmas and therefore he needs them to be in good condition. There is a balance to be struck as a manager and he has to take a much longer view than the fans do.

Basically I get our conservative start. I understand fans who want us to push all season, attack from the off. The reality of top level football makes that a big ask to maintain. Pardew is very cute and has again made some very intelligent adjustments mid game. We have continually picked up points. I'm sure he'd like to be sat here now with a few more points (mainly the four dropped against Villa and Reading) but its not always plain sailing.

I think fans need to look at things at say the end of February and then decide if he has struck the right balance. We are not the Man U, Man C and Chelsea's of this world. We can't go full throttle all season safe in the knowledge we have 25 PL top level footballers in our squad.